‘WSJ’ launches New York section; ‘Times’ fires back

New York—The Wall Street Journal on Monday debuted its “Greater New York” section. The section, which will appear six days a week, has a dedicated editorial team that will cover real estate, politics, crime, the arts and sports.

“As others have retreated, we have been investing in content—there has never been a larger market for high-quality news and analysis, and the greatest market of all is New York,” Robert Thomson, editor in chief of Dow Jones & Co. and managing editor of the Journal, said in a statement.

“The Journal has a proven track record of helping advertisers reach an unmatched, quality audience comprising the most sophisticated, affluent and influential readers,” Michael Rooney, the newspaper’s chief revenue officer, said in a statement.

Advertisers in the section were mainly retailers, such as Saks Fifth Avenue, as the Journal continues its effort to expand its advertising base beyond b-to-b marketers. In conjunction with the launch, the Journal said it has teamed up with Foursquare, the location-based social network.

The new section was greeted with a sarcastic memo from The New York Times, an answering salvo in an escalating war between the two newspapers, written by New York Times Co. Chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and President-CEO Janet L. Robinson.

The heart of the memo emphasizes some strengths of the newspaper’s New York audience, which includes more than 900,000 affluent adults on weekdays and a median household income of more than $118,000 for Sunday readers.

The memo concludes, “So as our welcome gift to New York, we pass on a few helpful hints to our Journal colleagues: the Dodgers now play in Los Angeles. SoHo is the acronym for South of Houston. Fashion Week has moved to Lincoln Center. Idlewild is now JFK, and “Cats” is no longer playing on Broadway.

“If you happen to know anyone who works for the Journal’s new section and he or she wants any additional information about the greater New York region, tell them to check out NYTimes.com’s always very helpful archive.”